ACT UP's Contest to Rename the Dental Dam

Condoms have become commonplace

i in American life, household words if not
- household items everywhere. But what do

you use for safe sex with a woman partner,
whether you are a man or another woman?
There is another latex safe sex accoutre-
ment out there, the problem is, we don’t
know what to call it.

Dental dams, six inch by six inch latex
squares, are used during dental surgical
procedures and women have started using
them for safe oral sex. But they are not
widely manufactured or distributed and,
let’s face it, there's not much sexy about
dentists’ equipment. The Women’ s Caucus
of ACT UP (The AIDS Coalition to Un-
leash Power) is sponsoring a contest to
rename the dental dam in an effort to pro-
mote awareness and use of the things, and
in so doing, to also promote the reality of

P women as sexual beings who enjoy sex but

also must protect themselves and their
partners from possible transmission of
HIV, the virus believed to cause AIDS.

Women’s sexuality has remained in-
visible during the age of AIDS and we are
simply told that we have nothing to worry
about if we have “normal” sex with one
male partner and don’t use I.V. drugs. But
more than 80% of heterosexual transmis-
sion cases in New York City alone are
among non-I.V. drug using women.
Women are told to use condoms, but not
taught how to negotiate safer sex with their
partners.

Lesbians are not factored into the
equation at all because, according to Dr.
Charles Schable of the Centers for Disease
Control, “lesbians don’t have much sex.”
But there are at least three documented
cases of woman-to-woman transmission
and women have three times the number of
“unknown” modes of transmission accord-
ing to the CDC figures. The possibility that
HIV can be transmitted through cunninlin-
gus, or going down on a woman, didn’t get
any attention at all until a man contracted
the virus frotn oral sex with a woman.
Clearly HIV is present in menstrual blood
and vaginal secretions.

The medical establishment is not in a
hurry to recognize women’s sexuality, so
it’s up to women to talk about it and teach
ourselves about new behaviors. Also, ACT
UP asserts that boxing people into “risk
groups” is deceiving and dangerous be-
cause it is g'§k mhavigrs, not identity, that
determine risk. For instance there are lesbi-
ans who use I.V. drugs or have had unsafe
sex with men.

“The contest is in a fun spirit, but we
hope that it can help make women aware of
safer sex for thgfl, and having safe sex
related to their lives while also promoting
sex itself,” said Marion Banzhaf, one of the
creators of the contest. She added that not
enough is known about transmission dur-
ing oral sex with women to take the risk of

baffifif-fl'eC SCX- (Continued on page 14)

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